Overseas Protection and Resettlement

Canada is directing resources to its group processing initiatives at the expense of its global program for refugees seeking protection through resettlement;

1. Resettled refugees and dependants abroad of protected persons are required to repay the costs of overseas medical exams, IOM processing charges, and travel costs;
2. Under IRPA, Canada has made a commitment to resettle refugees who are most in need of protection, many of whom have multiple barriers to their integration;
3. Repayment of these loans by single mothers, youth, and families further marginalizes and impoverishes these groups, diminishing their capacity to integrate;

1. There has been no functioning central government and/or other public institutions to protect vulnerable groups and/or prevent human rights abuses in Somalia since 1991;
2. In the past year, humanitarian workers and human rights defenders have been the victims of an increased number of targeted killings on the part of both the Transitional Federal Government and armed militia groups;
3. Humanitarian workers, human rights defenders and civilians who are not protected are forced to flee both inside and outside their country in order to find protection;

1. The Colombian conflict has not lessened during the last year;
2. Different international organizations have pointed to the continuation of political persecution and human rights violations;
3. Displacement levels are higher than ever before;

1. The Private Sponsorship of Refugees (PSR) program was established on the principle of additionality;
2. In November 2006, the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration increased the upper limit of the PSR target to 4,500 persons in order to allow for flexibility for sponsors to respond to visa office referred cases without decreasing the number of sponsor referred cases processed;

1. Shelling is occurring in northern Iraq;
2. The relationship between the Kurdistan province in northern Iraq and the central government is fragile and could lead to violence at any time;
3. Iraqis are being deported from European countries to Iraq;
4. Canada has a moratorium on returns to Iraq;

1. The protection of Canadian citizens overseas, including Mr. Abousfian Abdelrazik who is stuck in Sudan, is an essential component of citizenship rights;
2. The denial of a Canadian passport to Mr. Abdelrazik may set a negative precedent of two-tier citizenship and leave citizens with a refugee background in orbit;

1. There are 3,400 Iranian dissidents in Iraq at Camp Ashraf who were granted protected persons status under the Fourth Geneva Convention by the Multinational Forces in Iraq. In December 2008 protection of the Camp was handed over to the Government of Iraq;
2. In January 2009, Iraqi National Security Adviser Mowaffak al Rubaie threatened to make life “intolerable” for the residents of Camp Ashraf in order to spur them to leave Iraq;
3. Among Al Rubaie’s threats was the forcible relocation of the residents from the Camp, where they have lived for more that two decades and constructed a fully developed town, to an empty desert near the Saudi Arabia border;
4. Both Amnesty International (AI Index: MDE 14/012/2009, 20 April 2009) and the European Parliament (resolution April 24, 2009) have protested Al Rubaie’s threat of intolerable treatment;
5. The recent introduction of a large Iraqi police force into Camp Ashraf despite the presence of both the Iraqi and US military at the Camp has alarmed the international community;
6. George Okoth-Obbo, Director of International Protection, UNHCR, in March 2007 asked the Government of Iraq to refrain from any action that could endanger the life or security of the residents of Camp Ashraf such as their forcible displacement inside Iraq;

1. The right to access asylum in Canada is a legal international obligation under the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees;
2. Resettlement of refugees from abroad, although not an obligation under the Convention, is a demonstration of Canada’s responsibility sharing and commitment to refugees;
3. The global trend of States to limiting access to asylum is causing the shrinkage of asylum space as the needs increase,

1. A humanitarian catastrophe has been unfolding in Sri Lanka since early this year;
2. More than 300,000 Tamils displaced in the North and East of Sri Lanka are trapped in a deteriorating humanitarian situation and Tamils in other parts of Sri Lanka are vulnerable to harassment, humiliation and threat of violence;
3. The largest Tamil diaspora community lives in Canada;